


Madness of Two

by kvlo



Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Brendol Hux's A+ Parenting, How Do I Tag, M/M, Manipulative Armitage Hux, Mutual Pining, look he’s been through some shit okay
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-07
Updated: 2021-03-07
Packaged: 2021-03-13 18:21:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,876
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29905176
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kvlo/pseuds/kvlo
Summary: Madness of two: in which one person takes on the delusions of the other.See: the way that Armitage needs Ben to come and pick him up on a Friday night when everything has gone to hell makes Ben feel needed. When did they both start needing each other?
Relationships: Armitage Hux/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren, Armitage Hux/Kylo Ren
Comments: 2
Kudos: 5





	Madness of Two

The night sky is cold and heavy around him while Armitage waits for Ben to come and pick him up.

It is a stark contrast from the stale, smothering quality that the house he’s grown up in has. He almost doesn’t mind that his canvas shoes are being soaked through by the dew in the grass, and he sighs and watches his breath hit the air. He bites his lip and tries hard as he can not to shiver, even as his nose grows colder and his fingertips start to numb.

_Be right there_ Ben had told him, fifteen minutes ago.

If he wasn’t speeding, he would be a little while longer.

But Armie is sure he’s coming, just like he always did when he texts him after dark like this, just as sure as he is now that his mother is never coming back. He steels himself and starts to count the stars while he waits.

He doesn’t make it very far before he sees headlights in the distance, cutting off at the end of the block just like he’s prompted him to many times before.

He sped. The red head can tell.

Sighing, he rushes over to the car, all but throwing himself into the passenger seat and trying to warm his hands up against the air vents after he buckles himself in.

“You didn’t have to speed. I’m not going anywhere.” He mumbles. It was the right thing to do. He shouldn’t be encouraging him to fly down these twisty back roads in the dark, not like this, not for him—

“I wasn’t gonna fucking leave you there like that. Now come on, we’re going.” Ben almost sneers, as though Armitage has any say now that he’s strapped in to the passenger side of his car. It’s like he thinks he’ll up and leave any second even though he is right next to him, and maybe there is some residual fear that he will from the beginning of their... friendship?

Yeah. That’s all this is, right?

Armitage sighs.

He stays quiet while Ben backs down the road and starts driving back to his house, breathing deeply and hoping his folks won’t mind seeing him again all too much.

At least it was a Friday. At least the bruising on his arms isn’t quite that evident.

* * *

  
Armie had to marvel, yet again, over how even Ben’s middle school gym sweats are a little big on him. 

Ben had handed them over to him again once he’d remembered that Armitage left the house completely unprepared to spend the evening. As he tried to settle them onto his hips comfortably, he wondered if this was part of why Brendol was so disappointed in him.

_Thin as a slip of paper, just as useless._

It probably would have been easier if he had slurred it in one of his more recent drunken fits, but unfortunately this dig was said while sober. And it had stuck with him for years.

He’d wonders, sometimes, if Brendol would like Ben better than him. He would probably be a perfect portrait of a young man in his eyes, Armitage is sure. Tall, starting to come into some muscle, and even inclined to solve problems with fists and not words... much to Ben’s parents’ dismay.

He also knows though, that he would never, under any circumstances, want Ben to come to his house and see how they were living right now. Things had been a little strange lately. Drop off at the end of the street, drive away. That was the standing rule of their friendship, and Ben respected it- as much as he grimaced when he cut the engine off and watched Armie walk away.

“You don’t have to go back, you know.” Ben tells him, once Armitage is dressed in his old clothes and they’re both sitting on his bed. The suggestion is so absurd that Armitage can’t help but laugh a full laugh, smile breaking across his face.

“Ben, where would I go? I- he’s my dad. He owns the house.”

Ben sighs, exasperated.

“So what? You’re just going to go back to dealing with that shit again after this? Just like last time? And the time before that?”

“Well, where else would I go?”

“Here. With me.”

The suggestion is so absurd that Armitage is stunned silent.

It lasts for a few moments before he can even formulate a response.

“... Ben, you can’t be serious.”

“I am. We could tell my parents—.”

“ _No_. Absolutely not.”

“But—.”

“Ben, _god_. He’s... I... I need to think about this, okay?”

It feels like his head is swimming, because the unspoken but cardinal rule growing up was you never tell. Not anyone, about anything. You can say you fell down the stairs, or you fell off your bike (that you don’t have), or maybe even that you’re just clumsy... _if you’re asked_. And only if you’re asked.

Ben was a risk he took though, and Ben was risky enough. And clearly Ben was a bad idea, and he kind of knew he as a bad idea when he got into this, but sometimes bad ideas just happen when you have feelings.

Sometimes Armitage wonders if he was a bad idea that happened while feelings were involved.

“I...” Ben makes that sad, wounded little face he makes when he’s frustrated, sighs, and then slumps a little. “Fuck. Okay. Just... for fuck’s sake Armie, at least think about it?”

Armitage leans against the headboard, because damn he wonders if Ben knows what it does to him when he calls him that.

“...Okay.” He mumbles, not meeting his eyes.

Ben’s Discord pings, interrupting the moment, and Armitage glares up at him. He knows, logically, this isn’t his fault, and realistically he interrupted Ben’s night and his plans...

And really, this anger is directed at his other school friends who just aren’t here to glower at.

“Oh, sorry.” A rare apology from Ben Solo as he goes over to the computer to fiddle with it. “I uh... kind of paused game night for...”

“Yeah.” Armitage sighs. “Your friends don’t like me, you know.” He tacks onto the end, half hoping to regain some of his attention that way.

“What? I mean, they’ll get over it, you know? Sometimes stuff happens. Hennix does stuff after games some nights.” Ben shrugs as he pokes something on the keyboard.

“I don’t think they’ve ever liked me.”

The weight of the statement hangs in the air between them, and hazel eyes finally meet sea foam. Ben does something else with the laptop, and then makes his way back over to the bed.

“Well, that’s just too damn bad, if they don’t.” Ben shrugs as he gets back on. “I like you.”

In that moment, Armitage seriously considers just telling Ben’s parents everything (because, really, at the very least Leia would probably feel bad for him), for the sheer satisfaction that would come with being able to monopolize all of Ben’s time. Then there would be nothing either of those two idiots could do or say about it anymore and _oh god would they share a bed if he did that—_

“I’m not even sure I like me, some days.” Armie settles on instead, because realistically that’s not a leap he can take but this is one he can. So Ben takes his face in his hands, and _god_ he’s so warm... the ginger kind of hates that he can feel tears bubbling up in his eyes from all of this, this was just supposed to distract him from his stupid Discord games—

What was that thing about playing stupid games and winning stupid prizes?

“Hey. _Hey_.” Ben tries gently instead. “How much of that is him talking?”

“I don’t know.” Armitage whimpers, and _fuck_ he hates looking like this in front of him, because fuck maybe Brendol was just right all along, maybe he is completely useless, he can’t even keep from crying when all he wanted to do was get Ben to quit ignoring him for his stupid grade-school friends—

He guesses it worked though, because now Ben is gathering him into his arms and letting him sob against his chest and make a mess of his shirt.

“Hey. Okay. Hey, but anyway, if they’re saying shit to you I wanna know about it. Armie, hey—.” He mumbles into his hair and rubs circles into his back while the other cries, and Armitage cries harder.

It’s not that though. Not really. It’s that Ben is warm and wrapped around him and pressed up against him and he wants what he can’t have. But he supposes when he comes up for air he’ll have to come up with a good explanation for all of this that just isn’t that.

He takes a few more shuddering sobs in and tries to compose himself, looking up at Ben with wet, glassy eyes, and sighs heavily.

“I... it’s no big deal...” he mumbles. “They just don’t know me the way you do and have made a lot of assumptions.”

And he has to be honest, he doesn’t exactly make it easy for people to know him. It’s just that Ben is strange and persistent. The type of determined that decides a queer, quiet kid with clothes from the secondhand store is someone you’re going to continue bothering after working on a group project together.

Or maybe that’s because they were both lonely, in different ways.

“They both know better. Shit, they’ve probably been hanging around Voe too much again. She’s really judgy like that.”

Armitage has to admit, from Ben’s stories, he’s kind of glad he doesn’t know Voe. It sounds like they had quite the falling out before they met, but she’d probably actually hate him as not just take up his time.

Ben takes a breath and starts again.

“Look, if you want to tell me about it sometime though I won’t be offended. They’re still my friends, but I know they don’t always get it all right. And really, if they’re saying things...”

“Ben, it’s okay.” Armitage holds a smile and leans into him, trying to get it together. “Really, it’s okay. I think I’m just tired after everything, is all. But... thanks.”

So instead, the darker haired boy wraps an arm around him and exhales.

“What a fucking night, right?”

“Yeah. I’m sorry about—.” Armitage starts, and Ben shushes him.

“No, you know what. That was shit of me. I should have just told them I wasn’t coming back. You _need_ me more.”

Armie _wishes_ he hadn’t said that. Not because it wasn’t true, but because he has this horrible, creeping fear that it... might be.

It makes his blood run cold and his throat tight and his stomach sick.

“And I really need to here for you.” He mumbles, and if Armitage twists the words all around in his brain he can pretend they mean something else entirely, and dammit he can’t cry twice in one night—

Ben runs his fingers through his red hair, mumbling something about it being soft as he does, and Armitage hates it and loves it and wants it to stop and wants it to continue on forever all at the same time.

**Author's Note:**

> This was going to be a one shot, but when I started typing I felt like it was meant to be more than that. It didn’t even quite hit everything it was meant to in the first place when it reached a very comfortable conclusion, so I left it open to build on that. 
> 
> As promised, here are some more detailed content warnings:
> 
> There are some allusions that Brendol hits Armitage sprinkled throughout the work. 
> 
> Armitage is pining hard over Ben. He’s a little bit manipulative in his ploys to gain his attention sometimes.
> 
> This is a high school au. Please don’t read on if that’s not your cup of tea. It’s meant to be a bit of a reflection/catharsis in some ways.
> 
> I’m not sure where the rating will land if I do update due to subject matter. I’ll update accordingly. 
> 
> I’ll add more here if need be when and if I end up updating this. I want people to be able to make informed decisions about what consume. Happy reading if you give it a chance, and thank you if you’ve given it one.


End file.
